The IIA welcomes the Minister for Research and Innovation, Sean Sherlock’s recognition that the existing method of gathering stakeholder feedback for consultation is not sufficiently interactive and is not reflective or representative of the medium used by internet stakeholders.

The IIA is happy to provide a mechanism for online submissions on the Copyright Review Consultation Paper to gather feedback on this paper. The IIA is currently preparing an online survey which includes each of the 86 questions posed in the Copyright Consultation Review Paper. All members and indeed non-members can enter their comments on the issues, ideas and opportunities raised therein. This will allow the IIA to collate the views of its members and enable us to comprehensively represent their concerns and ideas to Government and input into this important legislation. An IIA working group will be assigned to review member feedback and assemble a position paper for submission to the department. The link to this survey will be available in the coming days.

Non-members are welcome to submit their comments using this survey tool. However, comments by non-members will be passed un-collated and un-filtered to the department as it would not be in the best interests of our members to use IIA resources in working for non-members. I believe this methodology strikes the right balance of being inclusive and facilitative whilst prioritising our member’s needs as we are charged to do. Allowing the widest stakeholder feedback is quite simply in the spirit of the community. Stakeholders are not limited to using this tool but it is open to everyone.

This is a great opportunity for the IIA to provide a mechanism for members to engage in policy formation and to be integral to internet policy in Ireland by representing the best interests of its members.

The Minister, in response to questions by the media yesterday said that people could contact the IIA who were going to facilitate feedback via an online forum. This survey is that forum.